The ongoing dispute with British Airways and Unite the union sees strike dates announced unless a last ditched attempt at an offer from BA can see it averted.

As it stands Unite have announced that there will be a walk out from cabin crew over seven days this month, keeping its promise that the strike would not be over the Easter holidays. The first strike action will be for three days from 20th March and a further four days from 27th March. Despite the avoidance of peak Easter holiday flights this will still cause a huge amount of disruption.

The response to the proposed action on BA’s website states: “If a strike does go ahead, we are intending to operate a range of flights. Not all our flights will be cancelled.

“We are currently finalising our flight schedules for the strike period and have temporarily stopped selling seats on all flights operating on the strike dates.”

All people booked to travel between 19th and 31st March will be able to either rebook or cancel and obtain a refund.

Further flight-specific information can be found on the BA website here.

Unite assistant general secretary and lead negotiator with BA Len McCluskey had this to say after talks broke down earlier in the week: “Regrettably, management turned down a remarkable offer from the union which would have given the company everything it said it wanted while also meeting our members’ concerns.

“However, despite spurning this proposal, British Airways management finally submitted a formal offer of its own to Unite yesterday. It is welcome that the company acknowledges that negotiated agreement, not imposition, is the only way to conduct mature industrial relations at BA.

“It is right that cabin crew should be given the opportunity to consider this offer, although it falls short of what we believe is needed to address the legitimate concerns they have about crew complement and service delivery. Unite will therefore hold a consultative ballot of our cabin crew members to ascertain their view on the offer. We would anticipate getting the result of this consultation by the middle of next week. However, we are unable to recommend the offer, and are therefore also setting strike dates in accordance with the mandate the union has twice overwhelmingly secured from our members.

“The consultative ballot we are holding will be concluded before the first day of industrial action is scheduled to take place. Should that ballot show a majority in favour of the company’s offer, then all the strike action announced today will of course be cancelled.”